Seahawks Opinion: Oh, Geno! Boy, the vibes, the vibes are fah-all-ing

The query is straightforward sufficient on its face: what retains us coming again for extra?

With the Seattle Seahawks, with the NFL, with the game of soccer usually and even with sports activities, interval — why will we do that to ourselves, when the outcomes are unknown at finest, and might wound not less than usually as they reward? How come?

Give it some thought. You undertake a crew, and all of it begins to occur. Fan lengthy sufficient, and every thing occurs. Generally a number of everythings, in all places even. Ups and downs take turns or stack on prime of one another, taking part in a ruthless emotional Jenga with our psychological well being as soon as every week or extra. And we voluntarily buckle in for the experience! (Although the voluntary half is debatable, for an additional day, haha.)

Is there a very good cause to speculate ourselves, our valuable time, plus perhaps our restricted cash, in fandom?

There are a lot of good causes, however for the sake of simplicity imma boil it down to 1: we make investments as a result of there’s the promise of a payoff. And since I’m actually fuckin’ dangerous at answering for “we,” I’ll decrease the moat to reply for “me” completely, and hope a few of you’ll be a part of me on this fortress of rightness.

Beginning with the unfavorable statements: I don’t derive the majority of my fanjoy from a profitable transaction. Or a shrewd wage cap maneuver. Or a well-negotiated contract that offers either side a win. Or a well-executed draft. Or perhaps a good W-L report, to be all the best way trustworthy.

I root most lustily for dudes with enjoyable backstories, nice vibes, quirky personalities, distinctive abilities, cool attributes. If that interprets into victories, all the higher. I like wins! Simply not as a lot as sick performs made by compelling individuals who encourage me to be higher.

At a granular stage, for the love of God/Pete/Roger, to ensure that there to be a payoff, the Seahawks simply must be enjoyable. First, they should nurture the stainless vibes. Then, they must be kinda good. Lastly, and it is a cherry on prime of the cherry on prime, it’s superior in the event that they’re nice.

And let or not it’s mentioned: this primary week of March has NOT. Been enjoyable.

Tyler Lockett’s anticipated launch got here as… anticipated, solely to be crushed 1 / 4 hour later by DK Metcalf’s bizarrely timed* commerce demand.

*or so we thought on the time

If anybody embodied consistency, tough explosiveness, wholesomeness, excellence and manufacturing, it was Tyler, briefly the NFL’s biggest receiver of the final 4 many years.

Dude revealed poetry in his spare time, for fudge’s sake. When he wasn’t wanting like rejuvenated Steve Largent crossed with Mikhail Baryshnikov.

For his half, Metcalf is a real-life Terminator, with all of the toughness and indestructibility implied. He’s indisputably a game-changer, a one-time diva who’s objectively grown up in entrance of our personal eyes. He’s concurrently a frontrunner, a uncommon specimen, and a superhero who occurs to put on “our” colours. A SportsCenter Prime 10 play ready to occur.

He’s the good dude on the sector at any time when he fits up, and to lose him could be/is heartbreaking. Possibly he comes again for 2025, however most likely not, proper? And the vibes are wrecked anyway.

If my crew had six DKs and gained six video games, I’d relish the season begin to end. With out a hint of hyperbole, that is irreplaceable content material:

Geno Smith’s redemption arc is scarcely price retelling on this house, the place lots of you might have it memorized. With Geno, I cannot miss the pink zone picks, however I’ll mourn each different facet of his sport. The common fourth quarter comebacks. The imperturbable pocket presence as his so-called protectors let down their guard, dropback after dropback.

The pure management. The repeated heroics. The connection with Pete Carroll that modified him for good and (selfishly) gave me hope for the second act of my very own life. For each certainly one of us who’s needed to make a contemporary begin after the primary stab at a profession or relationship failed, think about once more what Carroll did to assist Smith reclaim his life. That is significant shit, effectively past soccer.

It’s onerous to adequately put into phrases what it meant to see Geno lastly recover from the hump in his final assembly with the 49ers, producing with the game-winner by way of his personal legs within the waning seconds. What a strategy to say goodbye to them, after all of the torment he endured at their soiled little arms.

What a payoff.

These had been the moments I’ll keep in mind. These had been the vibes we misplaced. Gave away, actually.

With out Lockett, Metcalf and Smith, the 2025 Seahawks are a far blander facsimile of their current selves, a generic NFL crew that sports activities a pair dastardly dudes on protection however unknowns on offense probably holding the entire enterprise again.

Backside line, they’re abruptly not anyplace close to as enjoyable, and until they strike neglected quarterbacking gold like they did in 2012 and 2022, they’ll be losers too.

And who desires to spend money on that?